State v. Schumacher
| Decision Date | 28 September 2001 |
| Docket Number | No. 25194.,25194. |
| Citation | 37 P.3d 6,136 Idaho 509 |
| Parties | STATE of Idaho, Plaintiff-Appellant-Cross-Respondent, v. Joey SCHUMACHER, Defendant-Respondent-Cross-Appellant. |
| Court | Idaho Court of Appeals |
Hon. Alan G. Lance, Attorney General; Kenneth K. Jorgensen, Deputy Attorney General, Boise, for appellant. Kenneth K. Jorgensen argued.
Fred R. Palmer, Sandpoint, for respondent.
The State brings this interlocutory appeal from the district court's order suppressing much of the evidence upon which the State relied in charging the defendant with trafficking in marijuana. The defendant cross-appeals from orders denying his motion to dismiss the case on the ground that the statute under which he is charged is unconstitutionally vague and denying his motion to quash the order binding him over for trial.
Joey Schumacher came to the attention of law enforcement as a result of an informant's tip indicating that Schumacher might be growing marijuana in a barn on Schumacher's property in a rural area of Bonner County. After conducting an investigation, officers obtained a warrant to search the barn. There, the agents found a marijuana grow operation. Schumacher was arrested and charged with trafficking in marijuana by possessing fifty or more marijuana plants or five pounds or more of marijuana. Idaho Code § 37-2732B(a)(1)(B). Schumacher subsequently filed a motion to suppress evidence found in the search on the basis that the warrant was issued without probable cause. He also moved for dismissal of the charges and, alternatively, asked the district court to vacate the magistrate's order binding Schumacher over for trial. The district court denied Schumacher's request for dismissal or quashing of the magistrate's order, but the court granted his suppression motion in part. The State brings this interlocutory appeal from the suppression order, and Schumacher cross-appeals from the denial of his motions to dismiss and to quash the bind over order.
We begin with consideration of the suppression order, which was based upon the district court's determination that portions of the evidence submitted to the magistrate in support of the search warrant had been unlawfully obtained, and that the remaining evidence was insufficient to demonstrate probable cause.
When reviewing a decision on a motion to suppress evidence for constitutional violations, we defer to the trial court's findings of fact if they are supported by substantial, competent evidence, but the question whether, on the facts found, a search complied with constitutional standards is a question of law over which we exercise free review. State v. Holton, 132 Idaho 501, 503, 975 P.2d 789, 791 (1999); State v. Silva, 134 Idaho 848, 852, 11 P.3d 44, 48 (Ct.App. 2000); State v. Rusho, 110 Idaho 556, 559, 716 P.2d 1328, 1331 (Ct.App.1986). In this case, the facts are uncontroverted, and we are, therefore, presented with only issues of law regarding the application of constitutional standards.
The evidence presented to the magistrate in support of the warrant application was as follows. A citizen informant contacted law enforcement officers about a young couple who had recently purchased residential property in a rural area. The informant told Special Agent Walt Richard of the Idaho Criminal Investigation Bureau that the couple had covered the floors and walls of a barn on the property with black plastic, had boarded some of the windows and entries to the barn, and had installed additional power lines to that building. He said that the couple did not appear to have any employment, were always home, were standoffish, and did not associate with any of their neighbors. The informant also said that he had twice detected a strange odor coming from the Schumacher's property. Agent Richard determined from public records that a young couple, Schumacher and his wife, had purchased the property about one year earlier. Investigating officers then used a thermal imaging camera to videotape the Schumacher property from the air and from the ground around the perimeter of the property. Such cameras detect infrared heat radiation and are able to detect the relative amount of heat that is radiated by different surfaces. The resulting video images show objects in varying shades of gray depending upon the heat radiation detected, thereby disclosing whether one object or building, or area of a building, is radiating more heat or less heat than another. Both videotapes of Schumacher's property revealed an unusually high amount of heat from the apparently unoccupied barn. Agent Richard concluded that the source of this heat could be thermal lamps being used to grow marijuana indoors.
With this information in hand, Agent Richard asked for the assistance of Officer Terry Ford of the Idaho State Police to further the investigation. Richard asked Ford to conduct a traffic stop of Schumacher's vehicle so that the vehicle could be checked by a drug dog. Richard informed Ford that Schumacher lacked a driver's license and that his vehicle had not been registered in Idaho. While these officers were discussing the case from a vantage point near Schumacher's property, they saw the Schumacher vehicle leaving. Officer Ford stopped the car, which was being driven by Schumacher. Ford requested a license and registration check from dispatch and then led his drug dog around the vehicle. The dog alerted on both doors of the car, and Officer Ford then searched the automobile. This search yielded a small quantity of marijuana. Schumacher was arrested for possession of marijuana and was placed in Officer Ford's patrol car. Shortly thereafter, Agent Richard, who had been observing the stop from a distance, arrived and questioned Schumacher. Schumacher responded with incriminating statements that acknowledged his marijuana cultivation. Based on the foregoing information, Agent Richard obtained a search warrant. When police executed the warrant they found marijuana plants in various stages of growth along with other evidence. On his suppression motion, Schumacher argued that the thermal imaging evidence and all of the evidence obtained as a result of the vehicle stop was unlawfully obtained and therefore could not be used to support issuance of the warrant. The district court held that the use of thermal imaging technology constitutes a search, and the court therefore suppressed the thermal imaging evidence because it was obtained without a warrant. The district court upheld the validity of the traffic stop but suppressed Schumacher's statements made at the scene on the ground that they were involuntary. The district court then concluded that the remaining lawfully obtained evidence that had been offered in support of the search warrant was insufficient to demonstrate probable cause for a search of Schumacher's barn. Consequently, all evidence found in execution of the warrant was suppressed.
The Fourth Amendment prohibits warrantless searches of premises where the defendant has a reasonable expectation of privacy unless an exception to the warrant requirement applies. State v. Holton, 132 Idaho 501, 503-04, 975 P.2d 789, 791-92 (1999); State v. Schaffer, 133 Idaho 126, 129, 982 P.2d 961, 964 (Ct.App.1999). Here, it is undisputed that Schumacher had a reasonable expectation of privacy in his barn, that the thermal imaging was conducted without a warrant, and that no warrant exception is applicable. The State has contended, however, that the use of thermal imaging is not a search and therefore is not subject to Fourth Amendment restraints.
At the time of Schumacher's suppression motion and until a date after the oral argument in this appeal, the United States Supreme Court had not addressed this issue. It has, however, recently issued a decision that resolves the question. In Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27, 121 S.Ct. 2038, 150 L.Ed.2d 94 (2001), a divided Supreme Court held that thermal imaging amounted to a search. In that case, government agents had scanned the exterior of the defendant's home late at night. They found that some of the walls were emitting more heat than other portions of the home and more heat than other homes in the area. Based on the thermal imaging and other evidence, officers obtained a search warrant and discovered marijuana being grown in the home. The Supreme Court majority held that "obtaining by sense—enhancing technology any information regarding the interior of the home that could not otherwise have been obtained without physical `intrusion into a constitutionally protected area' constitutes a search—at least where (as here) the technology in question is not in general public use." Id. at ___, 121 S.Ct. at 2043, 150 L.Ed.2d at 102 (citation omitted).
Based upon this determination by the United States Supreme Court, the thermal imaging of Schumacher's barn was an unlawful search, and the resulting evidence may not be used to support the issuance of a search warrant or employed against Schumacher in a trial. The district court's suppression of the thermal imaging evidence is therefore affirmed.
Schumacher's suppression motion included a contention that the stop of his vehicle was an unlawful detention. The district court rejected this argument, and Schumacher raises the issue in his cross-appeal.
A traffic stop is a seizure of the vehicle's occupants, which implicates the Fourth Amendment prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures. Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S. 648, 653, 99 S.Ct. 1391, 1396, 59 L.Ed.2d 660, 667 (1979); State v. Atkinson, 128 Idaho 559, 561, 916 P.2d 1284, 1286 (Ct.App.1996). An officer may lawfully stop a suspect for investigative purposes only if the officer has a reasonable suspicion that the person has committed or is about to commit a crime. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 30, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1884, 20 L.Ed.2d 889, 911 (1968); State v....
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State v. Grimes, A–14–181.
...arrested until he consented to search rendered consent and subsequent statements by defendant involuntary); State v. Schumacher, 136 Idaho 509, 517, 37 P.3d 6, 14 (Idaho App. 2001) (“threats to prosecute a defendant's loved one when there is no legitimate basis to do so may be coercive and ......
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State v. Garcia
...concerning the genuine authority possessed by the police regarding anyone found complicit in wrongdoing. See State v. Schumacher, 136 Idaho 509, 517, 37 P.3d 6, 14 (Ct. App.2001) ("It is true that threats to prosecute a defendant's loved one when there is no legitimate basis to do so may be......
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State v. Grimes, A-14-181.
...arrested until he consented to search rendered consent and subsequent statements by defendant involuntary); State v. Schumacher, 136 Idaho 509, 517, 37 P.3d 6, 14 (Idaho App. 2001) ("threats to prosecute a defendant's loved one when there is no legitimate basis to do so may be coercive and ......
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Woodward v. State
...a warrant is required. See Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27, 121 S.Ct. 2038, 150 L.Ed.2d 94 (2001); State v. Schumacher, 136 Idaho 509, 37 P.3d 6 (Ct.App.2001). In closing argument at the conclusion of the hearing, Woodward's post-conviction counsel argued that, had defense counsel been ......